If We Were Different
by smileandwave
Summary: What would life be like if we Zero's could feel pain?
1. Running Away

I'm a new Loveless fan, and I totally love the NatsuoYoji zero pair!!! When I looked at the number of stories written about them, I was sad to see only a few, so I decided I'd give a shot at them hehehehe. Let the show begin!

If We Were Different

Rating : T

# of Words: 503

**Chapter 1: Running Away**

"Hey Yoji, what do you think it's like to be able to feel pain?" inquired Natsuo, looking at his sacrifice thoughtfully.

"I'm not sure. What brought this up and about?" asked Yoji, his eyes meeting the other's.

"Well, we've inflicted pain among so many… Sometimes I wonder what it feels like, to hurt." Natsuo looked away, a great sadness flickering in his eyes. Sighing, Yoji slowly drew his body up from his previously sitting position. He walked a couple of steps toward Natsuo, before offering his hand to help the other up. Graciously, Natsuo clasped his hand over Yoji's and pulled himself upright.

"We should probably get going," said Yoji, graveness in his voice. "We can't let _her _catch us." With that, the two fled the small shack they were using for cover, and headed back out into the blizzard.

The wind pelted their bodies with ice and sleet, snow flurries impairing their vision. Even still, they trudged onward, knowing if they stopped now, they would be in serious trouble. Hours upon hours they walked, until almost unable to move. Now, it wasn't that they couldn't keep going. They had the endurance to be able to continue their travels. They felt no pain, and could continue on even with severe injuries. Their problem was they had to stop periodically to warm themselves up or else they would die. This was the price of being a Zero; impervious to pain, but unable to stand up to cold.

"Let's stop here for the night," said Natsuo, raising a stiff arm toward a near by cave. After maybe ten or so grueling minutes of urging stiff limbs to plod to safety, they reached the cave. It sheltered them from the worst winds, and stayed plenty dry from any water that could possibly seep into the opening. There was not a lot of room in the cave; it was probably only a meter tall and maybe three meter's wide, with a depth of two meters. It was better if the cave was smaller though, they could conserve body heat better this way.

"It may be a little cramp, but we'll be warm at least," said Natsuo, cracking a small smile at Yoji. Then, Natsuo shoved Yoji back into the deeper part of the cave, putting his body in front of the opening. This effectively blocked out the cold, shielding Yoji from the relentless subzero temperature from above.

"Natsuo! You shouldn't use your body to block the opening!" growled Yoji, taking the other into his arms, clasping him tightly against his body. Yelping, Natsuo's body was drawn away from the opening, crashing lightly into Yoji's body.

"Now isn't this better?" purred Yoji, kissing Natsuo's cheek lightly before looking back at Natsuo.

"Well, if we both catch our death, you can't blame me," said Natsuo. Moments later, Natsuo nestled into Yoji's chest, curling up into a ball then falling promptly asleep.

"If only she liked him," murmured Yoji softly, closing his eyes and letting himself fall into unconsciousness.

Okay, now that was probably one of the suckiest beginnings to a story you have ever read, but I'm still trying to sort out my thoughts about how this story is going to run. Also, I didn't want to give out too much information all at once, because it'd be too overwhelming. I was kind of really vague here though… Ack, I hope people read this! So, please read and review so I can make this story even better!


	2. Setting Out

Okay here we go! Chapter two is up! I really, really, really, want reviews from people as well as for people to read this story!!!

Title: If We Were Different

Rating: T

# of Words: 1,083

**Chapter 2: Setting Out**

Yoji awoke to the sounds of soft breathing, and something heavy on his chest… Blinking a few times, he found that the 'something heavy' was actually his darling fighter, and that the breathing also belonged to him. Not wanting to disturb the sleeping body on top of him, he gently removed his arms from around the fighter's body and slowly slid out from beneath him. Once Yoji slithered out from underneath Natsuo, he cautiously crept toward the opening of the cave.

A blinding light hit his face, along with a head covered in snow once arriving at the cave's entrance. Shaking his head angrily, Yoji got the majority of the snow off of his head. He then stuck his head outside the opening – being especially wary of other snow puffs from hitting him – and scouted out the surrounding area. It had stopped snowing, which was excellent. That meant no more cold for the time being, giving them more time to seek safety. The overall appearance of the land seemed fairly safe. The land was pretty flat and barren, which made travel easier. The downfall to being on flat land was that it was very easy to be spotted by enemies. They were going to have to travel at a considerably fast pace to get through the land without being spotted.

Feeling something shift, Yoji looked back down into the cave, seeing Natsuo start to crawl toward him. Yoji moved over slightly to the side to make more room for the approaching Natsuo. For a while, the two just sat in the cave, leaning against one another in the small space of the cave. It seemed neither of them wanted to continue their long perilous journey away from that person.

"If life were that easy," said Natsuo to nothing in particular. He clasped Yoji's hand, pulling them both out of the cave and onto the frozen ground.

"We're going to have to move fast. We don't want to be spotted by anyone, and since there's no cover…" Yoji looked over at Natsuo, waiting to see his response.

"I agree, let's move out. We need to cover as much ground as possible. I think we should go at a slow jog, letting me go before you. If I slip, you'll know whether to avoid the spot I slipped on or not," said Natsuo. He cracked a smirk at Yoji who stuck his tongue out at him in response.

"It's not like I can feel the pain if I fall anyway!" Natsuo then took off, his feet leaving imprints in the snow.

"Wait up! You're a faster jogger than me!" called out Yoji, chasing after his fighter. The run seemed to take years for Yoji. He personally didn't like running around that much; it seemed like a waste of energy. He would much rather do something more fun, more exciting. Running ridiculously repetitive and boring. Especially jogging. In jogging, you had to conserve energy. That made it even more not fun; Yoji was the kind of guy who just wanted to let loose.

"Hey Yoji, how you holding out back there?" called Natsuo to his companion.

"Just fine, but jogging is so boring! Could we at least do a few sprints once in a while? I mean, there's no fun to jogging; it's the most bland thing you could possibly do!" Natsuo suddenly stopped unexpectedly, sidestepping to the right. Yoji, not prepared for the abrupt change in pace, tried stopping, but instead, flew right by Natsuo ending up landing flat on his face. An outburst of laughter overtook Natsuo, causing him to fall to his knees because of the fit. Yoji promptly picked himself off the ground, face red with mortification.

"How was that for a change in pace?" asked Natsuo, still laughing.

"Why you!" Yoji charged at Natsuo, pinning him to the icy ground. Natsuo still continued to laugh, despite the glare Yoji was giving him. After ten minutes of hearing Natsuo's cackling, Yoji couldn't contain himself any longer; he struck his friend square in the face. This caused the latter to look up in astonishment, shock clearly written across his face.

"Did you just strike me?" asked Natsuo, his voice quavering with unsureness. When Yoji didn't respond, Natsuo pushed Yoji off of him, pinning him to the ground instead.

"I didn't think you would ever strike me, even though we both can not feel pain," said Natsuo, eyes flickering back and forth nervously. His eyes seemed to grow large, as if holding back… Tears?

"Natsuo, I'm sorry. I didn't mean anything by it! It's just… I don't like being teased all that much," said Yoji, the words heartfelt and sad. Natsuo got off of Yoji, lending him a hand. Yoji took it, pulling himself up to look into Natsuo's eyes.

"I won't ever do something like that again, I promise," said Yoji, a small smile gracing his lips. "Well, unless you're out of line and aren't doing what I say, that is."

"Oh, well I'll see about that," said Natsuo, pulling Yoji into a warm embrace. "I'm sorry for teasing you so much lately, but it's just so much fun!" Natsuo turned away from Yoji and started to sprint ahead.

"Hey, you didn't tell me we were going to actually sprint!" cried Yoji, running as fast as his legs would take him across the slippery ground.

Natsuo's heart pounded in his chest, arms and legs pumping ferociously, propelling him forward and farther away from his companion. He could faintly hear the sounds of scampering feet behind him, belonging to Yoji who was trying to catch up, but he knew he wouldn't be able to. Ah, running was so exhilarating to him. Unlike Yoji, Natsuo loved the thrill of running; it made him feel good for some reason… But this time, he wasn't sprinting to go along with Yoji's wishes, it was actually to get away from the other so he could think.

He didn't understand what had happened back there… Why was Yoji so worked up at such a small joke? Sure, it was probably embarrassing; anyone would be embarrassed after flying six meters, falling flat on their face, and was laughed at for it. But he had never punched Natsuo before… Why now? And why was he even thinking so much over a small issue? All of a sudden, he felt his stomach lurch. A sensation of falling came over him, then an icy cold burst of something. That's when he blacked out.

Chapter two is done done, done, done! Left on a cliff hanger! I bet you want to know more! That's for next chapter, but for now, read and review!!! Oh, and PM me if you have any questions/comments/concerns/advice/ideas… Anything!!!


	3. Stranger's House

Hello again! I'm sorry about the confusion, or me deleting the first chapter accidently… I'm not that good with computers so if you happened to read the story, then couldn't find the second chapter which was my bad… In any case, keep on reading and reviewing!

Title: If We Were Different

Rating: T

# of Words: 1,223

Chapter 3: Stranger's House

_Where am I? Everything is black… Am I falling? I can't move my body… The light is fading from above me… I can't breath well, something's clogging my lungs… What's going on? Oh? I feel someone holding onto me… Is it a hand? Wait, I'm floating upward… No, I'm being pulled upward by whom? _

Natsuo's body was suddenly forcefully lifted from whatever he had fallen into and thrown upon the ice, his stomach pressed on top of the cold surface. He could feel someone prop his body up into a sitting position, then shaking him, rather hard he might add. He could also tell that this person was shouting a jumble of words at him. All Natsuo could register was that the person seemed very concerned about him for some reason. Once his mind cleared the haze that surrounded him, he could faintly make out the blurry vision of Yoji's face. Terror was written clearly across his face, his entire body shaking. Natsuo tried to sit up straight, only to have Yoji push him back down so that he was lying down on the ice. Coughing slightly, Natsuo gave Yoji a reassuring look in attempt to soothe the frazzled boy. In turn to this, Yoji put his body over Natsuo's protectively, shielding him from the coolness of the elements.

"You scared me half to death there, Natsuo," said Yoji shakily, his voice quavering slightly in places.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to, it just happened I guess," replied Natsuo, taking deep breaths to try to regain his vision. "Could you tell me exactly what happened anyway? I can't seem to recall…"

"Well, you were sprinting ahead of me, and then, all of a sudden, I didn't see you in front of me. I kept running, thinking you may have tried to pull another prank on me, but then I remembered that would be impossible to do because there's no cover for you to hide behind or underneath. A few feet before I reached where I thought I saw you last, I found a huge crack in the ice. Apparently, you weren't paying attention to where you were going; you ran right over thin breakable ice! And you're the one who's always telling me to be more careful," chided Yoji, trying to put on an annoyed face. Natsuo shot Yoji a sheepish glance, before his entire body writhed out of cold. This caused Yoji to turn on his complete serious side of him. He gently picked up his frozen stiff friend, carrying him bridal style, and headed off in search for cover.

"God, we need to get you somewhere warm. You're turning blue," said Yoji, fear etched into his voice. Natsuo managed to dip his head down just enough for him to nod, then let his eyelids flutter shut. Yoji held Natsuo's body closer to his, kissing the latter's chilled forehead lightly.

"I have to find somewhere fast, before he… No, I certainly will not let that happen!" Yoji shook his head, shaking the thought out of his mind. His pace picked up drastically, until he was running with the other clutched tightly to his chest.

Pound, pound, pound, pound. His feet thumped against the ground, the icy ground cracking with each step. Faster. If he went faster, he could save Natsuo. So he did exactly that. Every stride caused the pair to surge forward, moving with the speed of a cheetah. Well, maybe not that fast, but pretty darn close. The problem was how long Yoji could keep that pace up. He had to be able to last for quite a while, in case they didn't find somewhere safe soon.

"Damn this," cursed Yoji as he scanned the area, only seeing white. The land was completely barren; no place to go but across. And avoiding the ice colored waters was going to be even harder because they blended in so well with the surrounding whiteness. After twenty or so minutes of searching, the duo was still seeking refuge.

"Every minute passed is a minute gone in Natsuo's life," thought Yoji, his heart thumping wildly in his chest. While thinking this, Natsuo shuttered violently, coughing seizing his body. Yoji placed Natsuo down on the ground, setting him upright. He then rubbed small circles on Natsuo's back, easing his lungs and allowing air back into his system. Once the coughing fit stopped, Natsuo slumped forward, allowing Yoji to sweep him into his arms once more.

"It's getting worse. There has to be somewhere we can go," murmured Yoji, walking fast for his legs were too exhausted to carry them at a faster pace. His head swiveled from side to side, eyes peering out into the white seeking anything that could be feasible for a shelter. Just when all hope for finding shelter dissipated, Yoji thought he spotted a fleck of brown around a hundred meters to the left of where they currently stood.

"Yoji, I'm cold," croaked Natsuo, his body convulsing into spasms. His eyes were shut tightly as if in pain. After seeing this look, Yoji felt a piece of his heart chip off.

"Hang on, we're almost there," pleaded Yoji, forcing his limbs toward the building.

"Everything is turning different colors." Yoji gave Natsuo a bewildered look, increasing his speed even more if that were possible.

"This isn't good, he's hallucinating… Urgh, why us?" Yoji stroked the other boy's arm, curling the hand that was supporting Natsuo's upper body upward to rub some warmth into the rigid body.

He had to make it to that building, no matter what. His worn down body somehow found himself at the front of the brown shelter that he had seen previously. Up close, he could now see that the shelter was actually a small wooden house, its structure built steady and strong to hold out the cold. A large door stood in the front of the building, the last obstacle in the way of Yoji and Natsuo's protection. Smiling slightly, Yoji threw his back against the door of the house, praying with all his might that the door would budge. It did.

Yoji then found himself in the house, body laying on something soft. Carefully, Yoji stood up, wary of the quaking body in his arms. The soft thing he landed on was carpeting, completely covering the entire floor. It was possibly large enough to comfortably hold a family of five. There were a couple couches facing away from the door, arranged in a U around a small table. A desk and large table were positioned on the other side of the room, their surfaces bare. Other than that, there weren't decorations; the area was completely clean. Finding this a bit peculiar, Yoji subconsciously held Natsuo a little bit tighter to himself, an instinct to protect lingering in his thoughts.

The sound of footsteps echoing from somewhere up above the room they were in, causing Yoji to tense up even more than he already was. Eyes looking straight ahead, he thought he saw something on the wall move, causing the slamming of a door to shake him back into awareness. Whirling around, he found that the door that was open only moments before had shut. An ominous feeling reverberated in his gut as felt the door to see if it would open again. The door was locked. And they were locked inside it.

Well, another chapter successfully completed! How did you like it? Personally, I thought it was a little too sappy for some readers but I felt like adding some sappyness to the story! There isn't really any important information in this chapter (that comes for the next chapter!) so I'm not going to inform anyone about anything just yet. If anyone has any suggestions, I'm happy to accept and maybe add them to this story, so please PM me or review… Or both!


	4. Zero Tamers

Well, chapter four was really fun to write! Sorry for the long update wait, but I got caught up in a lot of stuff… Please enjoy!

Title: If We Were Different

Rating: T

# of Words: 1,515

Chapter 4: Zero Tamers

Fear laced through out his body as Yoji stood his ground, facing in the direction of the noise as if showing nothing would get by him. He knew his situation was pretty bleak, as he was not the fighter of the pair and could be hurt more easily, but still stood his ground. The footsteps from somewhere on the second level of the house was getting closer, making Yoji involuntarily shiver with fear. No, he couldn't be scared. Natsuo had faced things a million times more scary than this, right? He could do this. Whatever it took, he had to protect Natsuo.

Finally getting the courage to do something, Yoji opened his mouth, and screamed, "Where ever you are, I'm not afraid of you. Come down and please help me! My friend is in need of help!" His voice quavered, hanging in the air before he heard something drop on the ground behind him. Whirling around, his eyes went wild, a frantic look plastered on his face.

"llew, tahw od ew evah ereh? Elpuoc fo s'oreZ ti smees (1)," announced a loud voice, belonging to a teenage girl. Yoji looked her right in the eyes, trying to mask the fact that he was terrified out of his mind.

One thought ran through Yoji's mind at that point; how the heck is she going to help us if I can't understand a thing she says?!?!

"Would you mind explaining who you are to me, after you help us?" Yoji looked down worriedly at Natsuo, who had seemed to turn two shades bluer. He wouldn't last much longer even though they were in a warmer climate…

The girl just smiled and carefully lifted Natsuo's body from Yoji's hands without any difficulty, heading toward the couches. Yoji followed her like a shadow as they walked over to the larger of the couches, placing Natsuo down onto its surface. The girl murmured something in her strange language softly, and then, as if magic, the room became much warmer. With a few more words, a blanket was soon wrapped around and tucked under Natsuo's body. All the while, Yoji stared at the girl in shock. How the heck did she know magic? And at that, MAGIC REALLY EXISTS?!?!

"Good grief, what have I gotten myself into," thought Yoji as he began to analyze the girl better. She appeared to be a few inches taller than Yoji himself, and had a muscular frame. She had straight black hair that waved a little around the middle and ends, and wore a simple aqua-green pullover with a hood and a length that reached the ground. Once she noticed Yoji staring at her, her brown almond shaped eyes flickered at him, thus educing them into a stare down. Once she as satisfied with Natsuo's condition, she turned to face Yoji and, much to Yoji's astonishment, pulled him down to another one of the couches.

The shock on Yoji's face was priceless; eyes wide with surprise and mouth agape. The girl laughed, before folding her hands on her lap and began talking to Yoji. The problem was, Yoji couldn't understand anything the girl was saying; she spoke some kind of gibberish! When the girl looked at Yoji inquiringly, Yoji just grimaced and tried to tell her he couldn't understand a single word she said using various motions and not getting very far with them. The girl just laughed at him, pointing and gawking at Yoji's poor attempt to speak with her.

"God damn it! Why the hell can she not understand me," cried Yoji, letting out an exasperated sigh.

"It's because you don't have a translator on you, and because we speak a different dialect," said a voice from behind him. Nearly jumping out of his seat, he turned to face a man in his late thirties standing alongside a woman of the same age range. Yoji definitely knew there was something strange about this house; closing doors, moving pieces of furniture, crazy girls that speak in different languages, MAGIC? Ho much more crazy could tings get?

"Okay, so who are you, and where exactly am I?" Yoji shot them a questioning glance, hoping they could answer some things so he could at least feel safe in this place.

"Well, most people call me JT. The person beside me here is Claire, and the girl you were trying to speak to, her name is Sage. We're what you could Zero Tamers, and you have stumbled onto our house," said JT, smiling.

"Could you give me a little more background please," asked Yoji, still trying to figure everything out.

"We should first give you a tracker," said Claire, looking Yoji up and down as if to see what potential he had.

"What's you're name?" Both JT and Claire stared at Yoji, waiting for an answer.

"Should I trust these people," thought Yoji. "They did help Natsuo, so I guess that I could trust them…"

"Okay, my name is Yoji. Does that help with anything?" The two conversed with each other, before turning back to Yoji.

"Yes, it helps us greatly. Now, if you'll just hold still for a minute…" Claire stepped forward, a paintbrush of some kind in her hand. Telling himself to stay calm, Yoji stood completely still and relaxed, closing his eyes. He could feel the brush strokes push against his face, and then stinging pain against his skin. Whimpering slightly, he remained complacent, waiting for Claire to finish her careful work. Once she stepped back, Yoji opened his eyes.

"Would you like to see it?" asked JT, a mirror appearing in his hands. Yoji took the mirror gently from his hands, and held it up to his face. In pale blue ink, three wavy lines representing ocean lay on his face, as well as the English roman numeral of 2 crossing through the ocean. Interesting. They took apart his name and drew in on his face (2).

"With that, you'll be able to understand us all better," said JT. "You could only understand us without the marking before because we created a weak mind link so we could communicate with you for a short time. Young Sage isn't old enough to have mastered the technique, so she called for us to come down and talk with you. Also, because she doesn't have her marking, she can't fully communicate with you. She didn't want to get her marking because of personal matters, so I suggest you don't touch upon this subject with her (3)."

Upon further examination, Yoji noticed that both JT and Claire had pictures on their foreheads too, but they looked very different from his. JT's was a picture in a fiery red color, showing only his initials, the J cutting through the middle of the T at a forty-five degree angle, slanting to the right side. Claire's translator marking was done in a rich green, showing a bowl with money inside it.

"Well thank you for being so kind to me and my partner," said Yoji at last, breaking the comfortable silence that had settled over the group. Sage got up from her position on the couch and went to where JT and Claire stood, saying something in their dialect, which he could actually somewhat understand. He caught bits of words that sounded like 'tired' and 'sleep' thinking that she wanted to go rest somewhere. They both nodded, and Sage poofed to somewhere else in the bizarre house.

"Now that all this technical stuff is figured out, we should probably take a further analysis of your partner," stated Claire, walking toward where Natsuo lay. JT and Yoji followed closely behind her as she touched Natsuo's forehead gently. After holding it there for a while, she spoke.

"It seems as though you're partner is recovering. Slowly, but surely. He'll be up and about in maybe two or three days, but he'll be extremely weak at that time. I suggest you stay with us until you friend is fit for fighting, for traveling around these parts with a weakened fighter is quite dangerous," suggest Claire, glancing at the sacrifice.

"Thank you for your hospitality. I am happy we stumbled upon people with such caring hearts," said Yoji, looking back down at Natsuo. Seeing Yoji wanted to be alone with Natsuo, the pair left, leaving a small tray of food - which happened to appear out of nowhere once again - on the table.

"Hey Natsuo, guess what? You're going to be okay, and then we can continue on our journey away from her. You'll see, everything's going to be alright. These people we're staying with are really nice, and I think we can trust them. They seem to know a lot about our kind, and I believe we will become good allies with these people. Just get better soon, because we need to get on a move on it. If _she_ catches us here, I don't know what's going to happen…" With that, Yoji jumped onto the couch, curling up next to his partner and stole a kiss before falling into peaceful oblivion.

(1) I'm being mean! I want you guys to try and figure out what the message was! If you still can't, then just PM me and I'll tell you/give you a hint.

(2) I looked on a couple of sites to try and analyze the name Yoji and found out the first part (Yo) could mean ocean or sunshine, and that the second part (ji) could mean second, next, rule, or govern and decided that it would be easier to draw oceans and the number two than the other choices. Also, this name meaning will come up later in the future chapters.

(3) Some of the Zero Tamer's history will come up in future chapters, and Sage's past is quite important to the story so be on the look out for it!

Okay, so how was that chapter? I felt I got into creativity in this chapter, and packed in a lot of information so people may have to read it again and again to get the really important concepts. So PM me if there's anything people wish to say to me! And review too!!!


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